Gatland lets rip as Lions are shown up by amateurs in poor second half

Warren Gatland was unable to contain his anger after the Lions struggled in the second half against a scratch team that included several amateur players, before completing a 64-0 win.

Despite the scoreline, the tourists’ head coach was clearly aware that the performance was anything but convincing after half-time at Hunter Stadium.

‘There was some excellent stuff, and there was some average stuff as well,’ said a simmering Gatland.

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Unimpressed: Warren Gatland was far from happy with the Lions second half performance

Having gone into the break with a 38-0 lead against the Combined Country XV here, the Lions lost all composure and shape, and committed a raft of handling errors, so much so that they fell a long way short of the widely predicted century of points.

Afterwards, having told his players that their second-half work had fallen below the standards expected, he said: ‘That Combined Country team only had one training session together.’

The Kiwi’s dark mood was reflected in his curt answers. Asked if all his players had come through the game unscathed, he said: ‘Yeah, fine.’ So had another easy win against weak opposition been of any real use? ‘It was a lot of use,’ he said.

Different leagues: Alex Cuthbert runs with the ball as the Lions won with ease

Lions captain Brian O’Driscoll added: ‘We probably got a little bit flat, depth-wise, and some passes were thrown behind. We tried to kick on in the second half, but it just didn’t really happen for us at times.’

Ireland flanker Sean O’Brien said: ‘We set ourselves standards over the last couple of weeks and we want to maintain those.

‘We probably went away from the game plan a little bit and we were a bit sloppy in certain areas. There is stuff to work on.’

Flat: Brian O'Driscoll guided the Lions to victory but they were far from convincing

little to cheer about: Sean O'Brien walks off at the end of the game

The home side, a team containing 10 amateurs, were delighted to have rallied and been able to limit the tourists to 26 points after half-time. They felt they had revealed chinks in the Lions’ armour.

‘I think the Wallabies will learn a lot out of tonight,’ said coach Cameron Blades. ‘We had four props in our squad who hadn’t played any higher than first-grade premier rugby level. So for them to hang in there in the second half and for our set-piece to hold strong against a generally pretty dominant front row, the Wallabies might see some opportunities on the back of that.

‘In general the Lions are an outstanding side but we showed in the second half that if you can get in their faces, they will make a few errors.’

Tim Davidson, the Combined Country captain, added: ‘In that second half, we said the longer we could defend them, the more they would make mistakes and it seemed to come out that way.’